


Social Media and Other Grievous Errors

by fmo



Series: Social Media [1]
Category: Captain America (Movies), Marvel (Movies), Marvel Cinematic Universe
Genre: Cuddles, Gen, I don't know, M/M, Social Media, brief angst
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2014-04-16
Updated: 2014-04-16
Packaged: 2018-01-19 14:07:56
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,782
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/1472611
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/fmo/pseuds/fmo
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Bucky discovers Facebook and Twitter, takes a lot of unnecessary photos with his phone, and briefly breaks Steve's heart by not friending him back.</p><p>Or: sometime vaguely a while after the Winter Soldier movie, there's still a bit of distance between Steve and Bucky, but they're working on it.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Social Media and Other Grievous Errors

**Author's Note:**

  * Translation into 中文 available: [社交媒体和其他严重错误](https://archiveofourown.org/works/1769443) by [yuki812](https://archiveofourown.org/users/yuki812/pseuds/yuki812)



“Why does this happen to me,” Stark says, looking upwards to heaven (or, more literally, to the ceiling of Steve and Bucky’s apartment in the Tower).

The pile of shiny new Stark technology on the kitchen counter lies between Tony on one side and Steve and Bucky on the other. Bucky has not yet touched any of the offerings that Tony brought last week to “get you into the 21st century, which is apparently my job now.” This is the source of today’s strife.

Bucky looks wary, and Steve feels himself bristle up protectively. “We’re working on it,” Steve says.

“Sure,” Tony says. “Look, Barnes, this is hurting me in my _heart_ that someone who lives under my roof uses a burner flip-phone and cannot send an email, let alone a tweet. This is officially an intervention.” He jams his finger into the countertop for emphasis. “You, me, People’s Sexiest Man Alive 1944 if he feels he has to watch, right now, we’re getting you on gmail and Facebook at least.”

Steve isn’t sure if Bucky feels like he’s defending Steve, or if Bucky dislikes Tony’s attempts to give him orders, or if Tony’s tendency toward fast, sudden movements just keeps him on edge, or all of the above, but either way Bucky says, “Steve was gonna do that stuff. C’mon, Steve.” Bucky picks up one of the boxes of technological . . . things on the counter and goes over to the couch.

“Really,” says Tony, raising his eyebrows.

At this point, there’s nothing for Steve to do but say, “Thanks, Tony,” and take the rest over to the couch.

“Yeah, this is gonna go great,” Tony says with relish. “Friend me!” he calls from the doorway as he goes.

Once Tony’s gone, Steve just turns to look at Bucky.

Bucky shrugs and slides the laptop out of its box. “I know how to hack bank accounts, security systems—well, I did it up to about 2005, at least—but social networking was . . . not a priority,” he says. It’s still difficult for both of them to talk about Bucky’s time when—well, when he was the Winter Soldier.

Maybe, Steve thinks determinedly, this can be a moment of normalcy. He _does_ have Facebook and Twitter accounts, even if he never uses them because all he ever sees there are Tony, Bruce, and Jane’s conversations about science that he doesn’t understand (being as Clint, Fury and Natasha would never be so publicly private as to have real social networking identities, and Thor—well, no).

Also, Tony seems to have forgotten that the serum also gave Steve a more-or-less eidetic memory. He doesn’t always know all the etiquette for doing things on the internet, but he remembers what he did to set up his own accounts.

“Okay, well,” Steve says, angling the laptop toward himself on Bucky’s knees, “the first thing you have to do is, uh, pick your username for your laptop.”

You also have to pick a picture, apparently, that goes with your name. Bucky picks “Bucky Barnes” and a picture of an ice cream cone. As always, these days, Steve isn’t sure exactly what to read into this.

***

So Bucky gets signed up for Twitter and Facebook and gmail, and because Tony seems to like it, Instagram too. Bucky goes for “James Buchanan” as his handle in public, which is probably wise because nobody actually knows that Bucky Barnes is alive and it’s best for it to stay that way for now.

Steve feels a sense of satisfaction, both because they proved Tony wrong (Tony accepted all of Bucky’s friend requests) and because it was a nice afternoon spent doing normal 2014 things. Steve goes back to his room and carefully finds Bucky on each of the social networks and requests him as a friend, then goes to bed.

The next morning, Steve opens his laptop again with the vague idea that it might be fun to talk to Bucky on Facebook. This is what friends do in 2014, and Bucky is here now, and . . .

Bucky hasn’t accepted his friend requests.

Well, it is 7 a.m., Steve thinks. Maybe Bucky just hasn’t got round to it yet, or maybe he doesn’t know how. Steve resolves to help Bucky with it later, but before then he checks the news and reads about a new civil liberties and prisons case going to the Supreme Court and he makes a little post about it on Facebook with a link to the story, because he thinks it’s worth people hearing about.

After that, it’s just a day of working out and helping Sam practice with his new-and-improved Stark tech wings, but when Steve gets home 37 thousand people have liked or commented on Steve’s Facebook post.

Steve sighs.

Jane has posted more pictures of empty Starbucks cups with text saying, “Scientists at work! Send coffee!” Jane’s assistant Darcy has liked the post.

Pepper Potts has posted about Stark Industries’ new longer paternity leave for employees.

Tony has posted many pictures of himself wearing sunglasses and making peace signs in almost exactly the same pose but in various different locations.

Bucky has uploaded a new profile picture: his right forearm in the foreground, leaning over their balcony that overlooks New York, spread out in hazy detail far below. It’s clever because it would be unidentifiable to anyone else, but Steve would still know Bucky’s arm anywhere. The right one, just as much as the left.

Bucky has 25 new friends, all of whom are also friends of Steve’s.

And Bucky still hasn’t accepted Steve’s friend request. He hasn’t denied it either; he’s just left it waiting.

Steve checks Twitter, but it’s the same story: not accepted, not denied. Bucky has been bantering with Tony on Twitter, however. And also has been tweeting at someone (whom he strongly suspects to be one of Natasha's fake accounts) in Russian.

Steve puts the laptop down and sits back. He hadn’t expected this. Bucky is his friend—that’s the one thing he knows. And sure, this is just the internet but—Bucky is his friend.

Steve shuts the laptop decisively and heads out toward Bucky’s room. 

Where he actually finds Bucky is the living room; Bucky is using his new phone to take photos of . . . apparently a sandwich he made. Less than twenty-four hours on the internet, Steve thinks with hopeless affection, and already he’s taking pictures of sandwiches.

“Hey, Buck,” Steve says.

“Hey,” Bucky says, putting the phone aside to actually eat the (perhaps over-ambitiously large) sandwich.

“Uh,” Steve says, sitting next to Bucky on the couch.

Bucky moves his plate away. “Get your own, you big mooch.”

“I, uh,” Steve tries again. Just gotta grab the bull by the horns, he tells himself. “You didn’t accept any of my friend requests,” he finally says.

Bucky puts down the last crust of his sandwich and rubs his mouth with the back of his (right) wrist. “Didn’t see any friend requests from you,” he says.

“I did.” Steve knows Bucky is bullshitting him, anyway.

“Nah, you didn’t,” Bucky says abruptly, pulling his phone out of his pocket. He brings up Facebook and shows Steve.

Steve looks. And, oh—

" _Captain America_ ,” Bucky says. “Facebook, twenty million likes.” He spins the phone in his fingers and pockets it again. “Anyway, I didn’t think that was really you. Stark pays someone to do it.”

“I do it myself,” Steve says carefully.

“You’re Captain America a hundred percent of the time now?” Bucky says. "Look." He pushes the sandwich plate away on the coffee table. “The first time I met Captain America was on a movie poster. And the last time I met him—I shot him." His voice is low, and Steve tries to interject but Bucky doesn't stop. "And everything he says, twenty million people are paying attention. But Steve Rogers, well. That's different. I'll always go along with _him_. Long as I can."

Steve can’t help but smile a little. “You know you said the same thing to me when I asked you to join the Commandos.”

Bucky looks surprised. “Did I?”

“Yeah, you did,” Steve says. He didn’t really understand it even then, but maybe he understands better now.

Bucky is still for a moment, then brushes off his knees, stands up and picks up the plate. “Avocado,” he says, tilting the plate a little so that Steve can see the smudges of green. “Never had it on a sandwich before, but it’s good.”

“So you had to take a picture of it?” Steve says, raising an eyebrow.

“Hey, it’s 2014,” Bucky says dryly. “Gotta roll with the punches.”

That evening, Steve makes new accounts for all of his social networks. “Steven Grant” is the name he picks, unabashedly modeled on Bucky’s own name of choice. Even though this is 2014, maybe it’s okay to still want some things to be private.

Bucky accepts his friend requests a minute later; he’s Steve’s first friend.

Steve reads a few articles from the _New York Times_ website (with the usual baffled incomprehension that the Style section generates) while he waits for Bucky to tweet something at him, but what he gets is a creak of his bedroom door and a shove on his legs.

Steve puts the laptop down and shifts over to make room for Bucky to enfold himself into his bed, which Bucky does. Then Steve realizes that Bucky has pulled the covers up to take a picture of their feet together at the bottom of the bed.

Bucky examines the photo on his phone, and Steve leans over to see it. It’s definitely a picture of their feet; nothing special. “Why?” Steve says.

“It’s a 2014 thing,” Bucky says, tweeting the picture with the words _good night_.

“I feel like somehow I’ve made a terrible mistake,” Steve says, lying down into the pillows and forcibly extracting the phone from Bucky’s hands to put it on the nightstand. “Go to sleep.”

Bucky just shakes his head and wraps himself around Steve, big spoon style. The old Bucky was all talk, so it’s harder with this new Bucky who doesn’t say as much, but more and more Steve thinks he’s working it out. At least, Steve thinks to himself, Bucky seems to be finding he can express himself through the medium of photographs.

“I’m trying to sleep, stop laughing,” Bucky complains into Steve’s shoulder, poking him in the ribs. But before long, Bucky himself has caught the laughter from Steve, and this is far from the first time one of them caught the giggles and kept the other one from sleeping. It's just been a long time since it happened last.

 

 

**Author's Note:**

> Please comment!
> 
> Come say hi to me at fmowrites.tumblr.com, and if you found this fic through a rec, please tell me! I love to hear about being recced.


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